I'm about to go against everything I usually preach, but that's okay. It's time for action. Carrying around my ECO mug for late-night chai, making sure I recycle that Sunja's Sushi container and air-drying my hands after reading the latest edition of LavNotes is very self-satisfying in the name of environmentalism, but it's not enough. Although I am the first to say that lifestyle change is a vital part of the sustainability movement, I have come to the conclusion that concurrent advocacy is necessary if we hope to create long-lasting positive environmental change.
This is the year 2008. We have all watched "An Inconvenient Truth," and we all know that, in addition to inventing the Internet and successfully rousing an audience from the slightly awkward pulpit of a cherry picker, Al Gore speaks the truth on the actual and potential negative impacts of global climate change.
Scientific information is piled in front of us like pancakes at Lou's: possible global temperature increase of 10 degrees Fahrenheit (double that at the poles), several meters of sea level rise and the destruction of priceless planet resources such as the icecaps, tundra, hunting lands of the Inuit people and various species like the polar bear. "The Day After Tomorrow" looks tame in comparison (okay, I admit I didn't actually watch it).
The bottom line is that we can no longer ignore the situation. Inaction is just as much a decision as action. Global climate change cannot be reversed, but it can be slowed and hopefully stopped. There are solutions -- at least, I think and hope there are. Introducing policy to limit carbon dioxide emissions -- the leading cause of global warming -- will greatly reduce the likelihood of worse consequences. Congress has still not passed any policy limiting CO2, but new bills in Congress call for a cap-and-trade system, which associates a price with CO2 emissions. It would be very costly: Americans would be 2 percent poorer in 2050 than they would be without a carbon cap, translating to roughly $100 a month per capita. However, income is expected to double over that time, and the money from such a cap system would be used in research and development on energy alternatives, increasing efficiency and carbon sequestration.
It is time to meld advocacy with lifestyle activism -- to focus on the most effective of both worlds and go from there. One way for us college students to make an impact is to lobby our state senators, John Sununu and Judd Gregg, to extend existing federal subsidies for wind and solar power and energy efficiency, which are set to expire at the end of 2008. They could also vote for the Lieberman-Warner bill, which would establish a cap-and-trade system for greenhouse gas emissions with the aim of reducing them by 63 percent from 2005 levels by 2050.
Other initiatives such as the college student"led PowerShift and the 1Sky campaign have a goal to lobby political leaders to create 5 million green jobs by 2015, reduce carbon emissions 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050 and support investments in renewable energy rather than coal power generation.
Another solution is to lobby for a new College president who will support and implement green measures such as long-term environmentally sensitive building design (the proposed new Food Court can benefit immeasurably from student input), endowment, energy options and progressive resource use.
Our generation is rapidly gaining both the skills and the power to advocate for -- and to create -- positive change. Climate change is an issue that our generation must tackle. The way we respond to this challenge will define us. Nationwide college campus initiatives like Focus the Nation and PowerShift have already drawn new attention to the strength of the college student voice.
This, then, is a call to informed activism at all levels and in all fields. Individually, we are strong. Never underestimate the power of an ECO mug. But together, we are exponentially more powerful than the sum of our parts. And to my fellow '08s, just because most of us are graduating in five weeks doesn't mean we can't go out kicking. Go out and fight the good fight. Happy Earth Week!
